Video conferencing allow users at remote locations to communicate with one another for personal or business reasons. Other applications communicate visual data over a network for media-related or other purposes. In order to perform these applications, the central processing units (CPU) of user terminals are required to remain in an active state for the duration of the application. Continuous use of the CPU for this reason consumes significant power. Moreover, especially in the context of video conferencing, the CPU must continue to output the entire screen of the application at predetermined page or frame rates throughout the duration of the application. This further consumes power and makes the user terminals inefficient.